Mary of Bethany

In the Bible, she rarely speaks.

Mary of Bethany, that quietly introspective, introverted, unmarried woman who humbly sat at the feet of Jesus, soaking in His teaching and choosing what was the best thing even while being rebuked by her overbearing sister, Martha, was not known for her eloquence of words. Rather, she is entered into the eternal annals of biblical history for her gentle, quiet, unassuming, albeit powerful, actions of pure worship to our Savior and Lord.

At a time when women were not even considered worthy of being a witness in a court of law, when women had to depend on their sons and husbands to provide for their economic security, when women were considered second-rate citizens who were not allowed to be educated and certainly not allowed to become a student of any rabbi, Mary of Bethany upends every single one of these ancient cultural norms.

Mary studies under Jesus, she grieves with Him, and she anoints Him. She becomes His analogous bride. She is the one woman whom Jesus specifically commends as worthy to be celebrated, honored, and remembered when His story is told. Her actions, quite literally, speak louder than her mere 12 spoken words out of the 770,430 words in the New King James version of the Bible.

Mary, the Rabbinical Student

Mary, shockingly. sits at the Rabbi’s feet in the position and posture reserved strictly for male scholars and tutors, and she does so in front of Jesus’s disciples rather than providing the expected hospitality for His entourage:

“And she [Martha] had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus’ feet and heard His word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said, ‘Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore, tell her to help me.’ And Jesus answered and said to her, ‘Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.’” -Luke 10:39-42 (NKJV)

Jesus does not chastise Mary for assuming a typical male role. Jesus does not punish her for doing what is considered culturally inappropriate. As a matter of fact, Jesus, in this one critical moment, recognizes, welcomes, and encourages not only Mary, but all women, as equal to men who are now afforded the same opportunities for education and discipleship.

And Mary never had to say a word.

Her small, heartfelt action of submission and worship spoke for itself. Though she gave off the appearance of idleness, she didn’t argue or defend herself when her sister shamed, embarrassed, and condemned her in front of everyone. Mary quietly and intentionally disregarded the obvious strife that her behavior caused to her sister. Notice, instead, that Mary allowed Jesus to be her defender, her protector, and her voice to her family, to His apostles, and to the world.

Remember this, especially when choosing to follow in Jesus’s footsteps, that your decision may result in family discord. Let Him be your champion, and ignore people’s embattled words against you. Your actions, more so than your words, will speak volumes, especially to the One who matters.

Remember, too, Mary’s tutelage when you sit alongside men as their equal, rather than being subservient to them.  Mary of Bethany was the forerunner who, with one small act of submission, unwittingly began paving the way for women’s equality.

Mary’s sister Martha, for all of her boldness, assertiveness, and obvious capableness, missed that good part because she was distracted with serving. Mary, paradoxically, followed by sitting. Mary certainly was not idle even though she stopped moving; she was calmly focused and studious. Mary demonstrated the complete opposite of her sister’s frantic attempt to control her environment. She let go of daily anxieties and secondary, unimportant tasks in order to be truly mindful of the words exuding from His sacred lips.

Instead, Mary ingested Jesus’s every word. And that good part, that thing which could not be taken from her? Mary exemplifies complete dedication to the heart and soul of Christ. Mary paid unwavering attention to Jesus’s guidance, and she modeled complete deference to His Lordship. Mary’s purpose was to simply love Christ to the exclusion of everything and everyone around her.

Your Savior promises that His words, His Spirit, His saving grace, His favor, and your eternal salvation are secured when placed as the first and foremost priority in your brief life above all worldly things, and your salvation will never be taken away from you.

Mary, the Obedient, Grief-Stricken Sister

The apostle John pointedly mentions that Jesus loved Mary, along with her formidable sister, and Lazarus. Yet when Lazarus is about to die of a terminable illness, they are waiting for Jesus to arrive and heal their precious brother by snatching him from the jaws of death. But Jesus delays, and Lazarus dies.

Christ, because He loves them, delays His return to their house to show them the true miracle of resurrection and His power over the enemy of death. While it made no sense to Mary and appeared as if He had forgotten and dismissed them, just like we don’t understand when He delays His response to our prayers. Jesus, in hindsight, obviously had other, more marvelous plans for her brother and for us through His power over death and the grave. However, in that interminable period of waiting, Mary trusts Christ even though she does not comprehend why He seemingly chooses to ignore her heartfelt desire.

Martha confronts Jesus on her own, and then instructs Mary to go to Him. Mary quickly and wordlessly acquiesces to Martha’s urgent command, and runs to Jesus amidst her overwhelming grief and mourning, even as her beloved brother and Jesus’s dear friend Lazarus is four days rotting in a grave. With the exact same words spoken by her sister, and the only recorded words spoken by Mary (though with an entirely different, nonconfrontational, suffering spirit), she reverentially

“fell down at His feet, saying to Him, ‘Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.’” -John 11:32 (NKJV)

Jesus, then, by virtue of being not only God but also human, groans with her. His troubled Spirit mourns with her spirit. He weeps as she weeps. Because of her absolute faith in who He is, garnered solely by her willingness and dedication to knowing and peering into the true knowledge of Him, He returns the favor of empathizing with her despair and sorrow. That, in every way and especially in this tender scene, Jesus experiences the hard emotions of grief and mourning that He bestowed upon us when He lovingly created us.

Jesus wants you to know that your stream of tears does not mean you are weak. Your agony does not mean that you are bad person or that you lack faith. Your heartbreak does not mean that you are pathetic, fragile, powerless, or feeble. Because He perfectly mirrors those difficult feelings He has placed in us, He lets us know that they are important and necessary. They are not to be prayed away. They are to be shared, expressed, and experienced in community and also in private communion with God. He has made you in His image, emotions and all. He beckons you, just as He beckoned Mary, to His side during the most painful and challenging events of your life. Be comforted that He does not look down on you because you weep; always know that He is weeping with you.

Mary, the Anointer

Jesus, who was about to endure the most difficult week of His earthly ministry, chose Martha and Mary’s house in Bethany. approximately two miles from Jerusalem on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives, to prepare Himself mentally, physically, and spiritually for His crucifixion.

He has already shown Mary His very human emotions, a true gift and perfect example of vulnerability that Jesus gives us permission to experience our own. Now, Jesus is sharing the precious commodity of quality time with those whom He considers to be His affectionate and intimate friends. It is a mere six days before the last Passover that Christ will celebrate on earth, and He comes knocking on the door of His friends, to break bread with them, to sit at their table, to choose them as worthy of His presence.

And just like Mary, you, too, are Jesus’s friend, and He loves you. He is knocking on the door of your heart, calling you by your name, and inviting you to eat His bread and drink from His cup of the new covenant, one that permanently engraves your name with the ink of His blood onto the Lamb’s book of everlasting life.

Mary, at this moment, discerns that this is more than just a supper with friends. Just as introverts tend to quietly observe and take in their surroundings, Mary silently grasps the magnitude that His presence prophesies – that of His impending death. None of His disciples figure it out, despite Jesus repeatedly telling them that He would die and be resurrected in three days’ time. This reserved woman who sat unabashedly at His feet is the one who was able to perceive what was actually happening. She was purposefully preparing His eventual corpse with an embalming ointment to take away the stink of decomposition, as was the Jewish custom, in preparation for His funeral.

Again, she doesn’t speak; she merely acts with utter devotion and purity of heart.

Although this time, her actions incur the wrath of the apostle Judas. Before, Jesus’s followers took no notice of her. Now, Mary of Bethany is a threat to the economic status quo since she has the apparent audacity to spend an inconceivable fortune on anointing Jesus with spikenard, an outrageously expensive perfume, rather than transferring its worth to the poor.

Judas, like Martha before him, berates Mary publicly. He accuses her of wrongdoing, of appalling waste – this time of money rather than presumed laziness from works-based legalism or societal expectations. Mary’s motives and intentions are misperceived, and Judas jumps to wrongful conclusions, reacting to what he thinks he knows, and doesn’t bother to find out the truth underlying her behavior.

Mary, for the second time, does not utter one word in her defense. Instead, she relies on Jesus to be her protector.

Jesus, the Jehovah El Emeth – the Lord God of Truth – again comes to her rescue. Jesus knows her heart, and openly rushes to her defense by firmly and resoundingly admonishing Judas for everyone to hear:

“Let her alone; she has kept this for the day of My burial. For the poor you have with you always, but Me you do not have always.” -John 12:7-8 (NKJV)

This spikenard, by the way, is the 300-denarii (or a years’ worth of salary) supposedly set aside for Lazarus’s burial, which, apparently, was not needed. More likely, this spikenard was set aside as Mary’s enormous dowry, which, in ancient times, would be the customary money set aside by her family to give to Mary’s future husband so that he was recompensed for the cost of supporting his new bride. The dowry, in Mary’s case, would be incredibly substantial since Mary’s sister Martha is a wealthy citizen of prominence within their community, and would be used in negotiating a marriage contract ensuring Mary’s financial future to a bridegroom of equal status.

Notice that Mary, then, doesn’t just worship Christ with her time; she worships Him with her money at the risk of impossible poverty. She is incredibly attuned to His Spirit which she attains simply by sitting at His feet, and she – regarded as a lowly woman – is elevated by Christ as fulfills the promise that the exalted will be humbled, and the humbled will be exalted.

Christ not only elevates women; He specifically, through Mary, lifts up the introverted observer, the studious thinkers, the defenseless innocents, and those whose actions are wholly misunderstood.

Mary anoints the Anointed One, despite Judas’s strenuous objections, because she has Jesus’s blessing and words of approval. By commemorating Jesus, she then becomes commemorated herself.

Mary, the Analogous Bride

While the four gospels slightly differ on whether Mary’s anointing of Jesus’s feet was either two separate instances or one, John specifically mentions Mary as the one who adorns His feet with her hair:

“Then, six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus was who had been dead, whom He had raised from the dead. There they made Him a supper; and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of those who sat at the table with Him. Then Mary took a pound of very costly oil of spikenard, anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped His feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of oil.” -John 12:1-3 (NKJV)

This one minor phrase regarding her loose hair is highly significant during this time period because single women simply did not let down their hair in public. In essence, Mary was inadvertently giving the impression that she was a downright immoral, offensive harlot who was signifying her availability to men.

Yet just as Judas formed and reacted to a wrong impression of her character, so, too, do the other people in attendance mistakenly assume her conduct as anything other than purely sacrificial and devotional.

As Mary lets down her hair, she consequently relinquishes any hope of acquiring an earthly husband, for no respectful man would marry an unscrupulous woman. Mary is emphatically professing with her actions that she is instead representing herself as the loyal, true, steadfast bride to the bridegroom. She is purposefully and publicly giving Him her entire soul as her dowry. She is marrying herself to His teachings, to His kingship, to His lordship, and is giving everything of herself – her money, her reputation, and her prospects – to spend eternity with Him. She recognizes and embraces the high cost of devotion to Him, and yet would ultimately witness that the cost is incomparable to that which Jesus paid for us, for

“Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you” -John 15:13-15 (NKJV)

Mary of Bethany was Jesus’s friend. She obeyed Him. She gave her life to Him. She knew Him. She trusted and worshiped Him. She loved, adored, and understood Him.

Because of her mere 12 words and her inestimable actions, Mary of Bethany becomes one of the most venerated women in Jesus’s inner circle. You do not need to be discouraged because your passionate zeal for Christ may be misconstrued – God knows your heart. You do not need to covet the extroverted, charismatic personas of the mighty evangelists, for you see that Mary’s quiet strength is louder than the loudest mouth. You do not need to be a great talker – Mary herself proves that love is greater demonstrated with acts rather than words. You do not need to compare yourself to that successful family member, because you are just as important, endowed with the unique and precious gifts that God Himself has given you. You also do not need to defend yourself with harsh, biting words or to constantly argue your point; let God be your champion. Let Jesus be your friend.

Choose the good part – choose Him.

Amen.